3. An occasional exchange of pulpits by the evangelical ministers in the community has many advantages. It is a public recognition of the substantial unity of Protestant Christendom. It gives to the minister a wider audience than if always limited to his own congregation, thus enlarging his acquaintance and tending to secure for him the interest and confidence of the whole people. It is sometimes a relief, enabling him to make use of former pulpit preparations when specially pressed by the exigencies of pastoral work. In such an exchange it is obvious that courtesy and comity require that the minister should conform to the usages of worship observed in the congregation where he is thus officiating, and that the subject presented should belong to the Gospel as held in common by evangelical Christians, and not to matters controverted among them. In this, as in all relations with other pastors and churches, the minister should observe with scrupulous delicacy the requirements of courtesy and honor. 4. Union meetings are sometimes held by churches of different denominations for the promotion of a revival of religion, during the progress of which each church is expected to waive its distinctive peculiarities and all unitedly press on men the claims of the common Gospel. Such a union of effort has undoubtedly proved useful among feeble churches and in neighborhood meetings remote from large centers of population; for there, from the paucity of numbers and gifts, all the Christian forces must needs be concentrated in order to maintain the interest. In such meetings every consideration of honor requires that the subjects presented should be restricted to those common truths of the Gospel in which all are united; a departure from this is always to be deplored. Among strong churches, however, where gifts abound, the utility of such a union is more doubtful; indeed, it is questionable whether there are not positive disadvantages. For, (1.) The members of the participating churches in such a meeting are placed under unusual circumstances which often serve to repress rather than develop their activity, and thus the labor falls on only a few more prominently gifted persons; whereas, a meeting in which the responsibility rested on only one church would have drawn into active work the mass of its members, and secured to it the blessing which such general activity brings. (2.) According to the Baptist faith, the ordinances of the Gospel vividly set forth Divine truth before men, and in the experience of our churches their administration is commonly attended by the convicting power of the Holy Spirit in the consciences of those who witness them. But in a union meeting these cannot be administered, or even alluded to, without impropriety, and this element of power is lost. (3.) It is not unfrequent, at the close of such meetings, that the efforts of such churches to secure members from the converts result